Money makes the polls go round

With the 2000 presidential race already shaping up to be the most expensive in history before it has even officially started, Americans are examining the symbiotic relationship between democracy and the ocean of money in which it swims.

This is not a new controversy, of course. The grumbling over political corruption surfaces with each cash-soaked election. But for all their professed disgust, voters rarely count campaign finance reform among the issues most important to them.

Furthermore there is a strong political tradition in the United States that views the buying and selling of political expression as the ultimate embodiment of the free market in political ideas, and therefore as American as apple pie. In the words of the conservative columnist George Will: "Participating in politics by contributing money is not generally a vice, it is good citizenship."

With ever-increasing sums at stake, however, the suspicion is growing that campaign funds wielded by corporate interests do more to obscure than promote the voice of the ordinary citizen. One candidate for the Republican nomination, Senator John McCain, has built his platform this year on reforming a campaign finance system he calls "an elaborate influence-peddling scheme". By standing up to his own party's leadership earlier this year, he forced Congress to reopen the debate in October.

Among the Democrats, another underdog, Senator Bill Bradley, is making similar noises. Neither candidate is expected to win his party's nomination, but each has given the issue a public airing, which could tip the scales in October.

The focus of the debate has been Governor George W Bush's record $40m in campaign funds raised while he is still supposedly only "exploring" the possibility of a campaign. He is due to announce his policy goals in the autumn, but the pundits have read the cheque stubs and are already declaring the contest as good as over.

Bush's campaign chest dwarfs the relatively meagre scrapings of his challengers for the Republican nomination - except for the quirky billionaire Steve Forbes, who is paying his own way - and is more than double the funds raised by his likely Democratic opponent, Vice-President Al Gore. Indeed, the ex-president's son and namesake has raised so much cash that he has waived the right to federal matching funds.

By not accepting a government subsidy, there is no limit to the donations Bush may solicit. He also escapes federal limitations on how much he can advertise his wares on television. To his critics, this is all proof of how the Texas governor, with the help of his father's name and contacts, has been able to buy the nomination before the race really gets going.

Bush money already speaks volumes across the American prairies. It will be heard loud and clear this week at the Iowa "straw poll", a bizarre pre-primary at which Republicans (from Iowa and beyond) pay $25 for the privilege of casting their ballot in a popularity contest.

As the first quasi-official test of strength, the poll will draw a disproportionate amount of campaign spending. Some candidates will be paying the transport and entry fees of their supporters, and Bush will be paying out more than anyone. Yet in the eyes of such supporters as the political commentator, George Will, the governor's fundraising prowess is evidence of democratic vitality.

"Some of those who have difficulty attracting contributors say contributing is somehow a less seemly, less noble way of participating in politics than, say, giving time or labour," Will writes in the Washington Post. "But money embodies time spent working; money is congealed labour."

He sees the Bush fundraising bandwagon as a conservative groundswell, pointing out that as finance law limits contributions to $1,000, the $40m Bush war-chest represents the combined enthusiasm of tens of thousands of supporters.

The problem with the campaign finance system is that, under the 1974 law, acknowledged contributions represent merely the tip of the iceberg. There is no limit to individual or corporate contributions used indirectly to support a campaign, such as advertising the candidate's party or praising a candidate's policies on a certain issue. As long as neither the phrases "vote for" nor "vote against" appears, it does not count as a contribution. In today's parlance this is "soft money", and in the eyes of the reformers it is suffocating US politics.

"Soft money" is ubiquitous in Washington. The Democrats are as compromised as the Republicans, and Gore is still under a cloud for his efforts to raise money last time around from Chinese financiers. Of the current crop of candidates, only senators McCain and Bradley have promised to do without soft money. Democratic activists working for Gore admit they will need all the help they can get if they are to catch up with Bush.

A telling measure of how much soft money is slushing around Washington surfaced last week in a survey carried out by the Centre for Responsive Politics, which discovered that $1.42bn was spent last year on lobbyists trying to influence politicians.

Averaged out, that means $2.7m was spent per member of the US Congress. (It is not being suggested that all this money is paid over directly, but it clearly adds up to a lot of lunches.) Furthermore if the 20,512 lobbyists in town divided up Congress among them, there would be 38 people murmuring in the ear of each senator or representative.

It is hardly surprising that Congress never seems to get around to passing legislation that might limit influence-peddling. When the subject came up last year, its opponents kept talking until it ran out of time.

In October McCain is hopeful of mustering the 60 votes necessary to defeat the filibuster. Independent observers are less sure. And even if a campaign finance law were passed, it could be challenged in the courts as a limitation of free expression - an infraction of the First Amendment. In the US, money talks. It also has the constitutional right to do so.